Read Tuesday – one week to go!

I hope you’ve been enjoying the excerpts from my books that I’ve had in this spot for the last six weeks. At the end of each excerpt there was a coupon code for a 50% discount on the books from Smashwords. These are listed below if you missed them, or forgot to go and get them. They’ll all be on the READ TUESDAY website next week, along with hundreds of other books (there’s probably still time to get yours in, if you’re an author or publisher).

There are also some promotional prices now available on Amazon.com, and these should have transferred to your local Amazon store. In most cases these will be 33% off, although the UK discount may be more than that, since the ebooks usually retail at £2.10 on Amazon.co.uk – which is 2 guineas. Two guineas, get it? Princelings Fred and George? Guineas? Never mind.

Princelings Series Exclusive

I promised you some exclusive content – some hints on the story to come.

For 2015 I am planning to bring out all the paperbacks to date in a new format. I know I promised you that some time ago, but it’s a must for next year! After that I’ll be working on a series of short stories (possibly incorporating Willoughby’s Narrathon tales) which take the development of the realms and the problems of a changing society forward. I always imagined there would be a Chronicles of Marsh to draw some of the small adventures together before I got to the finale – which I started writing but realised I had to go through all the processes of change before I could really get going with it.

Dylan and Dougall featured in a piece of flash fiction in 2013 entitled X Marks the Spot, and I envisage this opening a novella or even a chapter in the final book as the Princelings of the North rescue Kevin, former Prince of Deeping, who has been exiled by Lord Colman, since he started to ask to many awkward questions about when Lord Colman was going to let him take over.

Dylan and Dougall then journey south with Kevin, who discovers that a disaster has befallen the Deeping – White Horse area, so he is homeless. Kevin then becomes a ringleader in the revolution seeking to ensure that everyone has a say in governing the realms, not dictators and kings. Some firebrands named Oscar and Midge might get involved with them.

The realms are full of unrest. Lord Smallweed at Castle Vexstein (always a nasty piece of work) has his evil deeds gradually exposed within the Kings’ Council, partly because escapees from his regime often end up in safe havens like Castle Marsh. Changes brought about in travel and communications due to George’s (and other people’s) inventions have contributed to changing attitudes and social mobility.

One good impact has been the effect of the modified strawberry juice fuel on a range of troublemakers, including the vampires and werewolves. Garlic! It makes the strawberry juice fuel cells much more powerful, but it has also weakened and finally driven away vampires, as we saw in How to Uncover a Vampire.

In some ways, I hope the tension of getting to the end of the series by a certain date is just as exciting as the musical I went to see in New York once – 1776 (the production I saw had Brent Spiner as John Adam). The calendar on the back wall was counting down to July 4th, the arguments raged, and you thought “they’re never going to agree it in time”!

In my case, I set the date in the epilogue of the first book – something I advise any budding writer never to do! In July 2021, Victor and Pogo have to turn up at Lord Mariusz’s castle, ready to do business. That’s what we’re all aiming for. I just hope we can get there in time.

Enough of the future… what about the Read Tuesday offers?

I mentioned above the special prices on the Princelings books on Amazon. Go to my author page/search for a full list of what’s available in your country.